Be Excellent To Each Other

So it's a puzzle platformer?

Except they couldn't be fucked to design many levels so they make the customer do it.

And that's supposed to save the PS3?

Just look at it!



If that doesn't make you full of happy then I don't know what would.

I can't wait for this. Finally the PS3 will have a reason to exist!

So youtube, it's a TV channel?

Except they couldn't be fucked to make many shows so they make the customer do it?

And thats supposed to save the internet?

A trailer showing some actual gameplay for a start.

Or indeed a game I didn't have to make myself.

I might buy it in America, as it'll likely be cheaper and my brother-in-law has a PS3 I could play it on while I'm there, but I'm worried they'll have replaced the UK Tom Baker narration with Ryan Seacrest or someone.

The internet didn't need saving, though - it already had loads of pron.

If Little Big Planet has every other game ever inside it because the level designer allows people to upload entire other games and was also free you'd be coming close to attempting to have a point.

So in short, I'm not wrong, you just all like the idea of paying £40 for Braid with a horribly fiddly level designer.

Fair enough. *Leaves PS3 until they wish up and release a demo of... well anything really *

It's an unlimited 2D platform game generating device. In 2008 that looks beautiful. It doesn't need to cover ever genre to have a point.

HOWEVER: I have a sneaking suspicion from reading the reviews that it controls like an amiga platformer. Nevertheless I can not fathom how the idea is failing to manage to light a spark of interest in you.

It's got a story mode which lasts several hours. It's not epic, from what I understand, but is comparable to a lot of modern games. And then you get to play squillions of levels created by other people, some which from the beta were apparently really awesome.

I doubt I'll make anything with the level editor, but I'll be downloading loads of levels other people have made. For free. For months, if not years. (Probably months.)

And it just looks lovely and my soul feels cleaner just from watching videos of it.



Valkyria Chronicles?

I thought YouTube was a place to post copyright-infringing music videos and TV shows?

With four-player same-console support. I know lack of splitscreen has really bothered a lot of people here.

Metacritic says:

Release date: 21/10/2008
Critic score: 96%, based on 15 reviews.
User score: 5.9/10 based on 1445 votes.

Yeah, because I'm sure that 1,445 people with advance copies of the game, and not 1,445 belming idiots rating a game they haven't played.

Looks lovely but I don't see the game.

I'm waiting to see what Team Ico have instore next, possibly the only thing that would make me consider buying a PS3.

I am excited about Heavy Rain.

I thought it would be like Smash Bros. or one of those side-scrolling fighters? (The camera follows the most number of players it can, when one of you falls out of the range, the camera would either stop, or pop the player who's lagging behind.)

You're not saying it doesn't even have same console multiplayer... right?

Oh, and, Klik 'n' Play is an unlimited 2D platform game generating device.

Well the lads from Consolevania seemed to like it. I believe the word 'Masterpiece' was used.

Is this out today?

think so

It is.

Ah yes, dispached today, with free t-shirt apparently.

Mine should be waiting at home for me. Yay!

order yours off shopto?

No, PowerPlay Direct.

I've been playing this most of the afternoon.

There is but one word:

Glorious!

It's so lovely. I have been sticking stickers of mine and Monkey's faces all over the first few levels. Not seen the level designer yet, but hopefully will work out how to do that when I have unlocked enough stuff.

Is there a 'friend' system on the PS3? I know Craig has a couple of people added but I am just a 'name' on teh PS3 and don't know how to add people yet. I'll see if craig knows later so we can get to some level swapping funtime.

For making some of the worst games imaginable, yes. The only decent Klik n' Play game I ever played was a Oh! My Goddess game where you controlled Skuld and ran around smashing those rabbit-bug things with your hammer and collecting gears. Fun for 10 minutes at a time, the most charming part was that it was all hand-drawn.

Steven Fry in abundance! This is fun!

It IS good fun, but I was a bit mniffed when the game crashed loading in one of the festival of the dead levels and the litle 'never turn off the system whils this icon is showing' icon was showing. Still, I put it back on a while later and it doesn't seem to have corrupted anything.

Does anyone have the combo of LBP and the eye camera thingy? You can take pictures of yourself (or monkey) and stick them all over the levels and your pad. Acebest, yes?

Is this PS3 exclusive? I would greatly like to play it, but am not getting a PS3.

Yes.

Sums it up for me. This game is pure undiluted fun, fun, fun. Anyone who doesn't come away from it with a huge grin on their face is dead inside. Or just dead.

I wouldn't know, it follows Sony's strict "No demos because then people might buy things and we don't want that" policy.

My review has gone up:

http://www.snappygamer.com/2008/11/11/l ... eview-ps3/

I've been writing about this in my blog, but my short review would be -

Yay! Best Game Ever! 997 bananas!

Careful now. If anyone in any custom level anywhere makes even a single extra banana, we'll be over the Chinnyhill Banana Threshold. Scientists can only theorise what might happen at that level of banana density; we may all be sucked into giant black hole and chopped up into a banana split.

You're talking about... Bananageddon!

It'll probably happen on a sundae.

Sorry to party poop...
I would give it...

Graphics - fantastic - 10/10
Sound - voice-over = sublime (Mr Fry! Woo!), sfx - functional, music, a bit poo in parts. - 8/10

Gameplay..
'Retro'
That is to say, unforgiving.
Major flaws... heavy inertia, sloppy back/forwards control leaving the character running in front/behind of the thing they are trying to get on - when it works, it works, when it doesnt, its a real pain getting it to do what you want & not what the game thinks you should do.

You 'slide' down slopes a bit freely. Upshot is, on platforms with round tops, you find yourself slipping to your death when you want to stop & look around. Compare to Mario 64 (the benchmark in my eyes) where the character will stop and wave his arms for 3 seconds before falling off (giving the slightly wasted gamer a chance to correct), here the game seems to actively push you off edges.

You die 3 times before the next save point & have to restart the whole bloody level. Why? Just, why?
In this day & age shouldnt we just be allowed to carry on from the last save point & not go all the way back. Wheres the fun in repeating sections just because the 'oh so realistic physics' decided that as you were standing on a slope with a pretty roundy edge, that makes perfect justification to push you into the insta-death of lava. Again.
3/10 - must try harder to be, y'know... fun?

Longevity:
I bought this for my ladies birthday, but apart from the fun intro & very nice graphics, she has played maybe 2-3 hours and decided its a bit pants as its basically too fiddly to control, and the game seems to be 'collect a million pieces of tat so one day, when you are really REALLY bored you can plaster them all over an empty level'.

Tried the online bit too, and had to log off in embarrasment after trying to jump on a car thing, but ending up jumping backwards onto a mine that blew up the car. Twice. Then the other (unknown) player got a bit shirty and started slapping me & making angry faces. So I left.
5/10

Overall - 6/10, a triumph of style over substance!

The actual platforming controls are about as intuitive as Tomb Raider's. That is, they're shit. It's an utterly charming game though.

Kittens: Controlling them is totally impossible. They shit. They're utterly charming though.

Not charming enough for me to throw down £308.49 by the sounds of it.

Throw down £308.48 for Club GTI, then LBP would only be £30

What's the big deal over GTI Club anyway? I remember it as being a kind of fun arcade game distinguished at the time by having a working handbrake on the cabinet. Maybe I never played it enough or something but I certainly didn't think "OMFG must buy" when I heard it was coming out on the PS3.

As I've said before my wallet will twitch (hopefully) when I see what Team Ico have planned.

Nothing has tempted me to buy a PS3 so far which is an absolutely incredible thing for me to be saying. Seriously, wtf happened Sony?

But... but... the controls are aces! I can jump and swing with gay abandon and have a great time. It's fast, fluid and the controls don't lead to deaths. It just feels right.

I don't have any real problems with the planes of movement thing, either, though my wife does. Odd.

Anyway, I probably put in about fifteen hours over the weekend, at least half of which were with my wife by my side playing through in co-op.

It's awesomely good.

I'm rapidly coming to the conclusion that this is a marmite game.

I think so. I absolutely adore what little of it I've played, but can completely understand why there are others out there that hate it. See also: Mirror's Edge.